Walking Dead Wizard

Chapter 15

Harry moved his body from under Daryl, leaning over him to get a good look trying to hastily find a bullet hole. Then he saw it, fresh blood oozing from a line at the side of his head. The bullet had grazed him; Harry could have passed out at the sheer relief that he wasn't injured further. That relief turned to fury as he silently seethed over what had happened. He was sick and damn tired of this group, first they fucking cuff Merle to a pipe and leave him surrounded by walkers then they shoot Daryl?

"I was kiddin'," Daryl muttered before his body went lax as he presumably fell unconscious.

"Who the fuck fired the shot?" Harry demanded, as he got to his feet, the fire in his eyes caused everyone in the vicinity to freeze, they could feel danger emanating from Harry, as if something was warning them of danger lurking that they couldn't see. His emotions were tightly wound causing his magic to lash out in his defence, bubbling under the surface, ready to come to his defence if he needed to.

Dale and Andrea were running up to them, with others bringing up the rear.

"Is he alright?" she asked horrified as she finally got to the others, who were still standing there wordlessly.

Harry gritted his teeth, "You put her on watch?" Harry roared, "You put someone who cannot use a bloody gun on watch against walkers? Damn you, you bloody lousy stupid idiots! You're not going to be happy until you've killed them are you? First you leave Merle cuffed to a damn roof left to die! He was trying to cut his own damn hand off when we found him completely delirious! Now this!? And you they told you to fucking let them handle it!"

Andrea gulped in fear as she stepped back away from the furious man, "I…" she tried to come up with something to say, but she couldn't. Every word that came out of his mouth was nothing but the truth.

"We need to get him inside," Rick said soothingly, trying to avert Harry's temper. He was used to dealing with angry people; it was part of his job, although Merle, Daryl and Harry were a whole different category of angry altogether.

Harry glared at Rick, "If I find her on watch again, I swear to Mer-God I will kill the one who suggested it and her, do you hear me? Thank fuck she's a shit shot otherwise she would have killed him." he waited on Rick to nod grimly in agreement before he crouched down and tried to lift Daryl up, Rick moved to help him, as did T-Dog knowing that Harry didn't have the strength for this.

"Oh and another piece of advice? Run fast and run far," Harry said coldly sneering in vindictive satisfaction, "I might not hit women but Merle? He's going to blow a gasket when he finds out you shot his brother." watching her pale and sway when she realized another truth in his statement.

"At least until Merle's had a chance to calm down and talk to his brother," Harry sighed tiredly, suddenly not in the mood for this at all. "His side is wounded, I don't know what happened but an arrow ended up imbedded in his side." He couldn't just go off and rest, he couldn't allow them to put any Muggle medicine into him, he had no idea how it would react to the potions, or whether it would cause him to overdose hell if he wanted something like that to happen. He glanced at the ground, only to find Glenn had already picked up Daryl's crossbow and his rifle, he gave a nod of appreciation at the pale man. He brightened up considerably afterwards though, glad that Harry wasn't angry at him.

"I need to go for supplies, Andrea you should come with us, Harry's right," Glenn informed her worried about what Merle could do. He would need time to cool down, even when he wasn't angry though he'd have some chosen words for her. None of it was going to be least bit friendly, although honestly, if someone had almost killed a member of his family he would feel the same way.

"I suggest you go now, there's no way he slept through that commotion," Harry said smirking ever so slightly as she whipped around as if she suspected Merle would be behind her already. Oh she was terrified he thought smugly, good, it served her right, he still couldn't believe the others had let her anywhere near a gun and it was a fucking cop in charge of the group too!

"Here," Glenn said passing over the weapons to Harry, before he began to jog in the direction of the stables, ready to get out of there as quickly as possible. Although going on a run was going to take a few hours at least, hopefully it would give Merle a chance to calm down. Yes he knew even as he said it that he might as well laugh at the thought. He turned around to see if Andrea was keeping up with him, and she was surprisingly, very quiet and scared, he wished he had something he could say to her but he didn't.

"What were you thinking?" Harry asked Rick shaking his head, as he moved with them, Daryl's unconscious body being held up between T-Dog and Rick as they moved. "I know you only just woke up a week ago, but you're a cop, surely you realize how stupid it was to put someone on watch that hadn't handled a gun and was currently trying to prove herself capable?"

"We've been spread out looking for Sophia and you," Rick sighed as he tried to defend himself, grunting as he tried to keep Daryl's dead weight from falling again. People he didn't know held the door open; an elderly man was demanding to know what happened, before without waiting on an answer told them which room to go into.

By the time they'd gotten Daryl situated on the bed, T-Dog and Shane had disappeared leaving only Harry and Rick in the room with Hershel as he went about cleaning the two wounds. Rick looked aghast at Daryl's back seeing his scars there wasn't one bit of his back unmarked.

"You can't give him anything," Harry said straight away, his voice booking no argument.

"He needs stitches," Hershel explained, sensing it wasn't just out of spite; it couldn't be he had heard this young man going off at Andrea when she had shot Daryl.

"He's already had something, I gave it to him twenty minutes ago, its strong, I don't want to risk an overdose, and he shouldn't be able to feel a thing. In fact he should remain asleep for a few hours probably longer." Harry revealed seriously, giving a nod of respect to Hershel who hadn't just assumed he knew better. To be honest he was surprised Daryl had remained standing and conscious as long as he had, the first pain reliever he'd had in the past had knocked him right out for over twelve hours more than that, he'd only woken up just before the leaving feast.

Hershel didn't ask anymore questions, he just got to work in stitching Daryl up, Harry grimacing each time the needle went under the skin. He couldn't help it, if Daryl had just let him help the damage would have already been fixed by this. Instead it was being done with crude Muggle means; it could get infected if he wasn't careful. Then again he doubted Daryl even realized what he was capable of other than what he'd seen so far. It had taken him years to get accustomed to the magical world when he first joined, even longer to learn what he could do now that he knew he was a wizard.

Harry and Rick both looked up when they heard footsteps running up the stairs, Harry already knew who it was, Merle always thumped like that when he wasn't hunting or tracking, Shane did as well but not quite as loud since Merle was more muscular than the sheriff.

"He's fine, I found him with one of his arrows imbedded in his side, Hershel's taking care of it, the bullet only grazed him," Harry said immediately, and Merle would trust his word over Rick's.

"What the hell happened?" Merle demanded, still looking at Harry, not able to get a good look at his little brother due to the fact Hershel was still busy closing up his wounds.

"I have no idea, Daryl will have to explain when he wakes up, and I've given him something for the pain so I don't think he'll wake until tomorrow." Harry gave him a pointed look, so he would know it was his potions. "He still has his crossbow so I don't think someone shot at him, and it was definitely his own arrow…" Harry told him explaining what he knew.

"If you had asked, we would have told you the horse spooks easily, she's called Nelly, as in nervous Nelly," Hershel explained, already suspecting what had happened. He chose that moment to step away, allowing Merle an unobstructed view of his brothers back.

Merle froze in the doorway, staring at his brothers back as if he had never seen it before, shocked to the core. Wordlessly opening and closing his mouth speechless. He was very familiar with those kind of scars, since they lay scattered all over his own back courtesy of his father. He'd never thought for a second that his father would lay a hand on Daryl, breathing heavily, his forehead pressed against the doorjamb as he tried to rein in his emotions, he wasn't good with them, never had been. For the first time in his life he realized just how much he'd failed his little brother. What must Daryl really think of him? He had left him behind; it was only because he knew he would have killed the old man if he hadn't. So he'd joined the army, figured it would be a productive way to let go of some of the anger, until his CO had pissed him off at least. Their father had never raised a hand to Daryl within his sight, not ever. "Son of a bitch!" Merle snarled, "I should have killed you when I had the chance." the urge to use drugs again reared its ugly head for the first time, anything just to quash these feelings.

Rick and Hershel didn't dare go near the man, he was volatile, he was seconds from snapping and neither wished to be on the receiving end of that lashing. It reminded Hershel of a spooked animal, one that had never received a day's kindness in its life until that one person had come along and made the animal fiercely protective of him yet somehow still skittish.

"Come on," Harry said, shoving Merle from the room, closing the door and forcing the man down the stairs and out of the house, way down through the greenery and to the fences. He still had his damn backpack, which he realised had cigarettes, hopeful it would help Merle calm the hell down. Shrugging his bag off, he removed the packet and a lighter before handing them wordlessly to the fuming man before grunting as he slid down a tree. "That the first time you've seen his back?" Harry questioned, but it wasn't really a question, he already knew the answer, he just wanted confirmation.

Merle's face snapped to his where he sat at the base of a tree, "Ya knew?" Merle asked his blue eyes somehow brighter than Harry had ever seen them.

"You forget I've been with both of you for months, I noticed them," Harry replied, observing Merle lighting his cigarette and inhaling deeply. "Obviously not properly, but yeah," not even thinking of telling Merle he'd been checking out his brother, what could he say? He was a hot crossbow wielding badass with an attitude problem, he wasn't sure if he had a type, but Daryl was definitely in a win column not that anything would ever happen between them, neither of the boys were gay, they were too prejudice of everything to accept someone who was gay never mind actually being one themselves, admittedly Daryl was nowhere near as bad as his brother, in fact from what he'd observed Daryl merely agreed with his brother when it was brought up. Ever since he stopped with the drugs though he'd mellowed big time. He actually liked this Merle more than the other, and he hoped Merle kept it up.

"You don't know anything," Merle snapped irritated that Harry had noticed them when even he hadn't, no he had spent his time in a drug induced world not seeing the pain his little brother was going through and it was killing him.

"Trying to take it out on everyone isn't going to make the situation disappear Merle," Harry said wisely, "It will still be there after you've taken your frustrations out on everyone you possibly can. This is a conversation you need to have with your brother, without it ending up in a shouting match."

"I had to leave," Merle growled his fists clenched, "Otherwise I would have killed him."

"That I believe," Harry said quietly, he could sense the one hundred percent truth from him. He wondered briefly who the 'he' was, it was obviously someone who had raised the Dixon brothers, father? Uncle? Who knew? He certainly wasn't going to ask any questions, he knew they wouldn't be answered, just like he'd never talk about his own uncle - he never really had.

They remained silent as darkness began to descend upon them, Merle continuing his quest of chain smoking every cigarette he had in the packet and Harry just being a quiet presence for Merle. Just in case he actually wanted to talk, but he knew that was unlikely. Plus as he'd always said he liked the brothers, the rest of the group minus Carol, Rick, Sophia and Carl he could do without.

"Harry?" Carol called, standing quite a bit away from both men, Sophia curled in her arms.

"Yes?" Harry answered, looking over to her curiously.

"Dinner is ready, we're having it inside today, and we made it as a thank you to Hershel and his family if you'd like to join?" Carol explained, "If you don't I'll bring it out for you both." she added in a rush knowing they weren't exactly comfortable in social situations.

"Actually I think we'll take it upstairs," Harry commented, "But if you would prepare three plates I'd appreciate it?" he questioned, wishing to avoid everyone and their questions he knew they'd ask. He didn't need to explain why he wanted to take it up stairs, everyone even Carol knew about what had happened to Daryl in his search for her daughter.

"I'll do that," Carol said sounding relieved, before she turned and walked away, letting her daughter grin and wave at Harry before they went back to the house.

"Come on, I'm going to try and heal your stubborn brothers wounds," Harry sighed as he got to his feet feeling better that he'd actually sat down for a while, although he was still exhausted.

"Can you?" Merle grunted.

"Not fully, not yet, not until Hershel won't want to look at it again, but I can make sure its healing internally and make it so the skin wont split or stitches come undone." Harry replied quietly.

Merle didn't reply, both of them wandered back to the house, worried about Daryl but relieved he was going to be fine. Merle still struggled to understand why his brother hadn't told him about what their father had done to him though. He hated that old man, he should have killed him when he had the chance, took his brother and found them somewhere to stay. Anything would have been better obviously.

Harry took two of the trays ignoring the looks he was receiving while Merle took the other, "Oh aye, thanks for the help," Harry said to Merle sarcastically, "Leave me struggling with two."

"You need to muscle up," Merle snorted, his lips twitching just slightly as they wandered up the stairs to see how Daryl was doing.

A few of the group watched them go actually amused by the banter between the two, more than a couple of them began to realize that Harry was good for the brothers, somehow he was able to calm them down. As shown when Daryl went nuts at Shane and Rick, and of course now this admittedly the tables had been turned on the cops but he'd managed to get Daryl to listen. They didn't know how such a short skinny young man could control such angry men but they were grateful nonetheless. They knew they needed the three of them to survive, not only would they have lost a lot more people at camp if it weren't for them, in fact Merle had saved Amy, which made Andrea's guilt triple, they also brought food in.

Too bad it took Harry angrily telling them for it to actually sink in.

Yup Merle's actually found out ;) so if they stay in the farm they will never met all those wonderful characters we like :) like Michonne prison arc... Jesus etc... in Alexandria so do they get chased off the farm? Do they keep the prison? or will they finally settle down in Alexandria with Harry finally revealing his magic? and yes wherever they are is where Harry will finally say enough is enough! :D so Farm? Prison? Or Alexandria? after the whole Terminus thing :D Will it be Merle that pushes Daryl and Harry together? or will Merle give his brother a hard time until he comes to accept it himself? Or will he feel guilty about the past enough to accept his brother fully? R&R please